


Emma's Secret

by SzonKlin



Series: Family Secrets [3]
Category: The Halcyon (TV)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-02
Updated: 2018-08-02
Packaged: 2019-06-20 15:32:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,051
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15537333
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SzonKlin/pseuds/SzonKlin
Summary: Emma visits Toby and Adil in Paris, where there are no laws and disapproving family to hide fromCan be read as a separate fic, but it makes most sense if you read it as part of the Family Secrets series





	Emma's Secret

Toby and Adil were startled awake by the sounds of a sick Emma in their bathroom.

They have been living together in Paris for over two years now and they had many visitors, but his was the first time Emma visited on her own. Knowing that they could hardly barge in on her, they waited anxiously for her to come out.

Their first visitors were of course Emma and Freddie, just a few weeks after they moved there. While Toby knew that what they had was not illegal, he was still afraid to go out with Adil, paranoid of what could happen if Adil and he were seen within a few feet of each other. So, the first time they could go out without a worry was with his brother and sister-in-law. The month the four of them spent together was the most careless month of both Toby’s and Adil’s life until then. After which it was easier to be in public even after their guests left.

By the time Lady Hamilton visited a few months later, all their Paris friends knew about them. Toby’s colleagues were more interested in the fact that Toby was with someone from the same country as their newest topic of interest, Shakuntala Devi, than with the fact that that someone was a man. Some of the staff working at the small Indian restaurant where Adil was head waiter might have had their opinions, but if they learnt anything during the war was that it was better to focus on their common roots than on their differences. And the owner of the small café in their building, Monsignor Dofour, whose son was taken by the Nazis always had free coffee for them when they had their usual breakfast there on Saturdays.

It was Monsignor Dofour who forced the dreaded, but much needed conversation between Lady Hamilton and Toby with his oblivious chatter about “his favourite couple” in front of the mother. There were lot of tears, lot of hugs, and laughter and ultimately a great sense of relief when the almost ten years old secret was out.

And so they continued to have a steady stream of visitors from the Hamilton Family, the Halcyon staff, other friends and just recently two of Adil’s siblings. But this was the first time someone came to visit them alone, and things were already going bad on their first morning.

It has been quiet in the bathroom for a while now and just when Toby decided to go in, decorum be damned, Emma opened the door and flashed an apologetic smile as soon as she noticed her hosts.

“Sorry if I woke you” she started, but Adil interrupted.

“Never mind that, are you okay?”

“You’ve been here for a day and you are already sick. Freddie is going to kill me” Toby groaned.

Adil quickly glared at him then returned to Emma. “Maybe it was a stupid idea to give you Indian food on your first night after a long journey. I should have taken the time to make you something simple and not just leftover from the restaurant. Come, sit down in the kitchen while I make you some tea and toast. Toby, you should get André to check her out – he is a medical student” he explained.

“It’s okay” Emma protested. “I’ll take the tea and toast, but I do not need a doctor. I probably just ate something on the plane and maybe the Indian wasn’t the best idea, but it is not your fault, Adil, I’m a grown woman, I could have told you that I’m not up for it.”

It took some more convincing, but finally Emma got them to stop trying to get a doctor or call Freddie and to get on with their day as planned. She got sick once more in the Museum they visited in the afternoon, but it went unnoticed by Toby and even Adil only suspected it. However, when she emerged from the bathroom the next morning after another episode and she found Toby on the phone trying to reach Freddie, she realized that she couldn’t go on hiding the truth.

“Toby, get off the phone! I’ll tell you what’s going on, just please don’t call Freddie” she pleaded.

“Emma” Toby put the phone down hastily. “Is everything alright with you and Freddie?”

“Yes, he just worries too much. But everything is all right. Perfect even. Let’s sit down.”

“This has been going on for a few weeks now. I went to see a doctor before I came here, and he assured me that I could travel. But I didn’t want to tell Freddie because he wouldn’t have allowed me to come and I don’t think I’ll be able to visit you in the next year or so. I’m pregnant.”

Toby let out a squeal and hugged Emma, soon joined by Adil.

“So, do you promise not to tell Freddie, or anyone else for now?” Emma asked after the first wave of excitement died down. “I want to tell Freddie myself after I get home and he really should have been the first one to know but you two are apparently more perceptive than my darling husband.”

“Or you are not as practiced in leading us by our noses as with him.”

“That might be it” Emma laughed. “Anyway, since you already know, I have a question for you. This is something we discussed with Freddie before. Would you be the godfathers of our baby?”

For the first time that morning, both men were stunned into silence. “Of course” Toby whispered finally. “We’d be honoured” Adil added with tears in his eyes.

A week later Emma went home after a fun, though more relaxed than planned, time, with the promises from the men that they would tell no one until they received official permission to do so.

A month later a very excited Freddie came for a short visit to tell them the news and to repeat their wish to have Toby and Adil as the godfathers of their heir.

A year later Toby and Adil visited England for the first time since they moved to France. Toby held baby Sam under the christening water alone but during the small dinner for the family Adil sat by his side.

**Author's Note:**

> This is just a small thing, as I like imagining our favorite couple living a free life.
> 
> I know little to nothing about the life in Paris, especially in the 1940s, even more especially for interracial gay couples so forgive my "artistic liberties", however if you notice any factual errors, please let me know.
> 
> Shakuntala Devi was an Indian mathematician who was also known as a human computer, as she was able to perform complex calculations quicker than an actual computer. I just picked her at random, looking for an Indian mathematician who might have been known in 1948, but as I checked into her life, it turns out that she married a homosexual man and later (1977) she wrote a book about homosexuals in India in which she expressed a supportive view


End file.
